Australian under 16s face social media ban

If your feeds seem a little off this week, it could be because hundreds of thousands of Aussies will soon go offline under Australia’s world-first social media ban for U16s.

Why do this?

Canberra says it’s about protecting children: whether it’s the WHO addictive use data or Jonathan Haidt’s best-selling book The Anxious Generation, there’s evidence linking social media to poorer sleep, classroom drift, bullying, predators, self-harm, and beyond.

Add some heart-breaking headlines, and it’s all sparked big parent-led movements Down Under to protect kids and empower parents (“sorry Reginald, it’s against the law“).

Then throw in a bit of bipartisan momentum ahead of May 2025’s elections, and boom — Australia’s parliament went ahead and passed this world-first legislation late last year.

Okay, then… how do you do this?

From Wednesday, the world’s top platforms (think TikTok, Insta, Facebook, Snap, X, YouTube, Reddit, Threads, Twitch, etc) have to use “reasonable steps” to verify user ages.

Uploading government ID can be tricky (privacy, access), so apps are also using things like facial age estimation and behavioural inference techniques to stop U16s from creating or maintaining profiles. Platforms (not the parents or kids) could face A$50M if they fail.

But of course, this kind of world-first shift also has plenty of critics, asking…

• Will it work? (kids always find a way)
• Will it make things worse? (kids might go to darker corners of the web)
• Will it breach user privacy? (age checks might need big biometric databases)
• Will it stifle free speech? (kids want to be heard too)
• Will it isolate some kids? (there are some whose only crew is online), and
• Will it just excuse parental responsibility? (ie, supervise your own kids).

And while Big Tech has avoided saying this next bit out-loud, tech titans also now stand to a) lose hundreds of thousands of sweet sweet accounts for selling ads, and b) burn millions rolling out age-verification tech at scale, then face big fines if it all fails.

Big Tech types also whisper that the ‘Let Them be Kids’ campaign pushed by Australia’s Murdoch-owned outlets was just a ploy to protect struggling legacy media, not kids.

Anyway, it all brings us to why a team of ex-diplomats would even care about all this:

First, it’s about Big Tech vs sovereign states: Australia is now the world’s first country to impose a hard-enforceable age gate on global platforms at a national scale, further testing the extent to which giant platforms can and will obey national laws. And that leads us to…

Second, it’s about the domino effect: if this works in Australia, you can bet others will follow — in fact, lawmakers across Europe, Brazil, and Asia are already debating their own versions of a youth social media ban. And speaking of other versions…

Third, there’s fear some regimes might use online safety as a figleaf to (say) stifle dissent and sideline youth already at the pointy end of ousting unpopular regimes lately.

And fourth, Wall Street will shudder as this all drives lower online youth engagement, higher operating costs, and a more fragmented internet demanding never-ending tweaks and government-engagement in each market, all inevitably hitting tech valuations.

So yes, this is partly just about whether young Reginald can still access the latest Robert Irwin fan edits or whatever young folks crave Down Under, but it’s also about something much, much bigger: figuring out the nature of sovereignty in an age of tech.

Intrigue’s Take

There are many angles here, but one less ventilated is this: amid US paralysis, a fellow US ally and democracy has now landed on a stronger case for regulating America’s tech giants: not the EU’s antitrust, nor the natsec debate grinding its way through DC, nor the free-speech wars still polarising the broader US and even its ties with the EU.

Rather, by anchoring this in children’s wellbeing, Canberra is arguably side-stepping those debates around content moderation, privacy, surveillance, and even data localisation, while building a coalition that somehow spans progressive activists to conservative family groups. That’s made it easier for lawmakers to support, and harder for Big Tech to oppose.

So all that to say… we might now be witnessing not Brussels, Beijing, nor DC/Silicon Valley, but a middle-power democracy setting the precedent that unlocks broader global regulation of US platforms, just by picking a specific, winnable battle. 

Sound even smarter:

• Australia reversed an initial exemption for YouTube in July after months of public debate (and objections raised by YouTube’s competitors). In response, YouTube has warned this ban won’t work and risks unintended consequences.